Friday, August 21, 2009

Weekend Box Office #148

The summer is just drifting by. I saw JULIE & JULIA -- and liked it -- but otherwise I haven't seen much of anything.

This weekend's new wide offerings:

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS (3165 theaters). Apparently it's too long and slow, but has its moments, sort of like the script. It'll probably do okay, though the 2 1/2 hour running time will hurt the box office a bit. Prediction: $19.5 million for the weekend.

SHORTS (3105 theaters). They are trying to sell this as a film for kids and adults, but apparently it skews pretty young, despite the presence of Jon Cryer and James Spader. Call it $22.4 million, just for the kid factor.

POST GRAD (1958 theaters). I haven't seen any commercials for this, though the LA Times review was pretty dour. $2.6 million.

X-GAMES THE MOVIE (1399 theaters). A limited one-week run, but are there really a huge amount of X-Games fans ready to pony to see this in a theater? $5.2 million.

******

Last weekend, DISTRICT 9 made a very solid $37.4 million, and should hold well. THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE did an okay $18.6 million.

THE GOODS did only $5.6 million, while PONYO did $3.6 million, and BANDSLAM stumbled in with $2.2 million; wow did they sell this movie badly.

Quintin Tarantino always makes "different" movies, BUT as of late I wouldn't put the moniker "good" in front of that. I like the fact he tries diffrent things and is a bit unpredictable, but his offerings of late are a far cry from "Reservoir Dogs" or "Pulp Fiction." Basically I think this guy is living on his past reputation. MAYBE his latest movie will reverse that trend, but watching Brad Pitt lead a team against the Nazi's just doesn't grab me as a show I wanna see. Could be a lingering disappointment factor from that "Gindhouse" fiasco Tarantino laid on us last year.

I couldn't disagree with you more vehimently. "Reservoir Dogs" was Tarantino's best. The only Tarantino film I can say I honestly LOVED. LOVED his plot choices, and the actors all maximised their contribuitions to this twisted bothched heist story.

I loved "Reservoir Dogs" so much so that I put my own spin on it. Trying to think like Tarantino I wrote a little low budget urban drama entittled, "The Judas Project." Logline: Three friends conspire against a fellow warehouse worker under the guise of launching a rock band.

I do agree with you, Matt, the girl's excessive dialog in "Death Proff" weighed it down considerably. WISH Tarantino had focused more on the car chase, and on Kurt Russell's ex-stunt man character, which was for me the highlight of an otherwise forgetable film.